Deploying service to GKE/Kubernetes leading to FailedSync error - kubernetes

Question

When deploying a service to Kubernetes/GKE kubectl describe pod indicates the following error (as occurring after the image was successfully pulled):
{kubelet <id>} Warning FailedSync Error syncing pod,
skipping: failed to "StartContainer" for "<id>" with CrashLoopBackOff:
"Back-off 20s restarting failed container=<id>"
{kubelet <id>}
spec.containers{id} Warning BackOff restarting failed docker container.
I have checked various log files (such as /var/log/kubelet.log and /var/log/docker.log) on the node where the pod is executing but did not find anything more specific?
What does the error message indicate, and how can I further diagnose and solve the problem?
The problem might be in relation to mounting a PD. I can both successfully docker run the the image from Cloud Shell (without the PD) and mount the PD after adding it to GCE VM instance. So apparently it's neither caused by the image nor the PD in isolation.

Answer 1

The root cause for this was apparently that the PD did not contain a directory which was the target of a symbolic link required by the application running inside the image. This cause the application to terminate and as an effect the image to stop, which apparently was reported as failed docker container in the shown log file.
After creating the directory (by attatching the drive to a separate VM instance and mounting it there just for that purpose) this specific problem disappears (only to be followed by this one for now :)